Laundry Day
by Clover-Reynolds
Summary: Craig Tucker has met someone who makes him so happy, so it's time to keep his promises. random slash,Craig/Thomas,Slice of life,Growing up,
1. Chapter 1

_Author's Note: Honestly I wrote most of this in two of my lectures while zoning out in a rare spark of inspiration. I wish I wasn't such a bad student sometimes, but that's what expensive text books are for._

_Holy crap who doesn't like Thomas? Seriously one of my favorite people of all time. One episode was not enough to have of this guy. And Fucking Craig is so hilarious throughout the whole episode. I hope this makes him so happy. This fic won't make a lick of sense to you if you have not watched Le Petite Tourette's. It's probably my favorite episode. Although that is so hard to choose. Well anyway, it's super hard to write about non main characters. I made up a ton of shit, and I know this is all fiction but it was kind of hard for me._

_I'm not sure how long this would be, honestly I have a few chapters planned, and I got the ending down. Just filling the rest in depends on how much fun I think it will be to write about these two, and how much interest there is for me to continue. I rated it M because I'm probably overestimating my ability to be profane and obscene, but I'll try my damndest._

_Also I might not sound like a little boy because I've never been one but I can't dumb it down enough so either Craig happens to be an intelligent observant 9 year old, or we can accept that I fail at life._

Craig

I'm sitting outside the councilor's office waiting for longer than I think is necessary, I mean my education is flowing through my fingertips as we speak. I am stuck out here waiting for this stupid fucker to come out and tell me the same shit he tells me almost every day. Has this really become my routine?

My dad keeps asking me if I'm just trying to skip class, which I can't stand to sit through anyway. My teacher doesn't even touch on what we are supposed to be learning about, according to my text book. So since I can't pay attention and I disrupt class by pointing out what a stupid idiot he is all the time, I get sent here. I could actually catch up on my schoolwork here, or in the study hall period they send me to after, or the detention I go to after that. But summer school is easy and I'm in it every year anyway, but I pass despite what my parents tell me.

The only reason I'm trying to pass at all this year is because the thought of being in Mr. Garrison's class ever again is like a death sentence. So even though I don't mind summer school so much, I have been finishing my homework, and I'm so going to pass this year anyway.

I zone out here, I sometimes sleep when they make me wait this long. Every time the secretary walks by I flip her off and she glares at me. She'll call mom again by the end of the day, but if she tries to talk to me I will call her a bitch. Because she actually is a bitch and she purposefully helps them keep me sitting here all day.

I don't get to doze off today because someone is suddenly sitting next to me.

"Hey Craig." I hear a muffled voice say.

"Hey Kenny." I guess because my head is leaned back and I'm staring at the ceiling tiles.

Kenny is the only kid I know who you can barely understand, he mumbles like crazy. He never really talks so much either, but I consider him a friend. I like Kenny, he's a poor bastard but he's pretty cool. I can actually stand to be around him, unlike his stupid friends.

I guess Kenny is only so cool to me because he's not Stan or Kyle or that racist fuck Cartman. I hate those guys.

"Whatcha in for?" I ask curiously. Kenny gets sent to the office occasionally, but it's usually because of something one of his uppity friends does. Sometimes it's because he has something in class that he shouldn't, I saw him play his Gameboy for two weeks straight before Mr. Garrison caught him. He said he had beaten it twice.

"I had an art magazine that just wasn't appreciated." I hear him mumble.

"Yeah? MAX or Playboy this time?" he's so predictable. He reads sometimes during class, but his usual book is a porno mag.

"Neither, I got a new one. You ever hear of a suicide girl?" he asks and I shake my head turning his way.

"What's that?" I ask. I hope it's not gross, like a bunch of dead chicks. Kenny laughs at my face and digs through his backpack.

"I got three, look." He shows me the magazine he buried. Funny guy, I always thought he'd have back -ups on hand.

The cover has a naked girl with pierced nipples standing over the brand of magazine, I can't read it. She has tons of tattoos, even one above her eye but she's totally hot. I can see the appeal, her hair is blue and it's in a Mohawk and I've never seen a punk chick posing like a playboy model. But it's not really my taste, I don't read those things anyway.

"Sweet huh?" Kenny asks me and I nod my approval.

"My dad had this in his top drawer, must be branching out." He comments and I laugh at him. He always steals his alcoholic father's shit. Gets away with it too, claims the old bastard isn't using them anyway.

I'm not sure what in all you do staring at a magazine like that, I've got a pretty good idea about these kinds of things but I'm not really interested yet. Maybe I should be, I mean naked chicks right?

I've been in the principle office for that kind of "contraband" before, stole a mag from the convenience store once. I just like to shoplift sometimes though and I didn't look through it but once.

I zone out thinking and I think Kenny is reading one of the magazines he just showed me, kid's got balls given that Mackey will walk out here at any moment.

I kind of start thinking about this thing I wanted to do, I kind of want to hang out with this kid I met. And it's random for me but I keep thinking about this, I mean most people you meet only one time you end up forgetting about. It's been months but I still really want to go hang out with him. He's just so cool. I don't know how to do it though, just walk up to the door and say "hey man, don't really know if you remember me but let's hang out."

Yeah right.

"Kenny?" I ask seeing if he will perk up from his perversion to talk to me.

"Yeah?" I hear him say. He puts down the thing he was reading turning to me. I guess he can tell from my tone that it's important.

"If some guy you met, like one time, came up and asked for you to hang out would you do it?" I ask lamely.

"Uh huh." He says and I look at him to see that he's serious.

"Why?" I ask and he shrugs.

"Why not? I just like to hang out with people and if someone wants to go have fun I'm game." He mumbles and I nod in agreement. Yeah why wouldn't you? Unless you don't like that person.

I'm silent for a bit and I know he's still looking at me but I don't really mind.

"So did you want to hang out with me sometime?" he laughs and I shake my head.

Oh wait, no I wouldn't mind that actually. I just meant that I wasn't talking about him. I sigh to clear my head and clarify for him.

Mackey finally opens the door and calls my name and I'm momentarily distracted from telling him what I meant.

I turn around in the doorway stopping Mackey from closing the door.

"Kenny, I mean yeah let's hang sometime. I was just talking about someone else though.

I don't hang out with Kenny, not for a few weeks anyway. But I decide I'm going to that guy's house. And on Saturday I ride my bike to the bus stop that goes the eight miles from South Park to North Park. I wonder if I'm a stalker or something I got his address and number from Kyle, who got it from a meeting they both had to attend together. I didn't want to ask Kyle, I don't like that know it all. And he kept asking me why, but I told him it was important and kept flipping him off when he badgered me about it. I guess he didn't care all that much because he gave it to me anyway.

I'm on the front step to Thomas's house, Thomas who I don't even have a last name for. The last time I saw the kid was at the television studio and it was only for a moment. He's got to be an interesting guy, I can tell. And I just want to hang out with him, I couldn't even say why.

But like Kenny says, why not?

I ring his door bell and wait. I think about what I'm going to say and I might sound stupid, I'm sure I'll sound stupid. This is so random.

His mother answers the door, she's blonde and older but kind of pretty in a too skinny old kind of way. She's wearing make-up and nice clothes and I wonder what she does for a living.

"Oh hello there, can I help you? I bought popcorn from the Elm elementary school kids a few weeks ago." She says and I'm confused.

"What?" I ask rudely.

"Boy scouts right?" she looks me over then seems to think that she's mistaken, I'm not wearing a uniform.

"No." I say and she stares at me.

"Sorry, do you need something little boy?" she asks and I glare at her.

I hate when people act condescending to me.

"Is this Thomas's house?" I try as politely as possible. I do want her to let me in, so I should be nice. I need to stop getting frustrated so easily, it's not good for me.

"Uhhh yes, yes it is. And you are?" she asks skeptically.

"I'm a friend of his, my name is Craig." I declare far too confidently. It's not really the truth but I want her to think I'm a nice guy, or at least familiar with her son. I definitely don't need her thinking that I'm some random stranger who can't stop thinking about how cool it would be to hang out with her son.

She seems surprised and I wonder why.

"Yeah hold on a second, I'll go get him for you." She says and I hear her go upstairs and call for him. She doesn't call me a friend, she just refers to me as some kid and I hope that's not all I am. I want to be his friend.

"Ah shit." I hear him say as he comes down the stairs. It's his tick, I can tell by the way it came out. His mom's in the other room and he just swore in front of her. Wow.

"Uhhh." He says to me and he just stares. The door is only slightly open and all I can really see is his face and shoulders sticking out. He seems honestly surprised by my appearance.

"Hi" I say and I can tell he's trying to place me.

"Hi." He says back and I watch him stare at me. I should probably say something now.

"Yeah, umm, my name is Craig. I met you at the television studio a few months back. You want to hang out?" I almost rush through to say. I look down at the ground, because that's a lot safer than looking at his reaction.

"Fuck cock." He says and I look up at him. That makes me smile, it's his tick again.

"I'm sorry." He says and I shake my head, he really doesn't need to apologize.

"That's okay." I decide to say. Better than "That's really awesome" because I heard he doesn't appreciate other people thinking his Tourette's is cool. That's what Kyle mentioned once.

"Hang out?" he asks and I watch him thinking it over. He thinks I'm strange. Yeah this is strange, but I stare at him as if it were the most normal thing in the world.

"Yes hang out. Like are you busy today?" I ask him.

He's thinking, his eyes go up like he's trying to see his own eyebrow and then he twitches again and swears softly. "Sh-Shit."

"I'm not busy today." He answers me. I can't tell if that's a yes or not. I shift slightly waiting for him and he opens the door.

"Okay, cool. We can get to it then." I say and he really seems to think I'm an alien or something. I walk inside and he looks around like he doesn't know what to do.

"So where is it?" I ask and he looks confused.

"Where is what?" he asks back.

"Your room?" I state as if it's obvious. That's where people usually go to hang out.

"Upstairs." He says and I head that way without him. I'm pretty sure he has no clue what to do with me. Guess I can take the lead here. He did say we could hang out so it should be fine.

I wait by his bedroom door because it's closed but he's close behind me, probably scared by the stranger who's come into his home. I wait for him to open the door and we both go inside.

"So what do you want to do?" he asks me and I shrug. I don't really care.

"Cocksucker ass bitch" he says and I smile trying not to giggle. I don't want him to think I'm laughing at him, because I'm not. I just think swearing is funny.

I stand looking around, truly interested in what this guy has in his room. It's cluttered and there are a lot of things on his wall. Like art work or sketches, I don't think they're even his. Some things are magazine clippings but a lot of it seems to have been printed from his computer. I don't know much about art but it's a lot of nature shots I guess.

He has a poster of a band that I don't recognize off hand, but they're all guys and they look kind of punk I guess. I'm not good with fashion either. His floor is clear but he has a lot of things placed about, a stool and a desk and a bean bag chair and a regular chair. And scarves hanging on a wall and a little bookshelf. I've never seen so much packed into a kids room, even Cartman doesn't have this much stuff. He just has toys but I can tell Thomas only has electronic like things, not baby dolls or stuffed animals. The top of his room is lined with one long shelf all the way across and it has a million little action figures on it. Like the comic book kind and little toy ones I think. I don't know much about that either. I don't really have hobbies or collections of stuff.

This room is cool, it's a cooler room than mine. I just let my mom buy me stuff and I have a bunch of toys laying around.

I could always offer to do what I said back at the station. I look for his laundry hamper and walk over to it.

"So should we get started?" I ask and he stares at me like he's been doing, like I'm a freak show and he didn't pay a ticket for it.

"What are you doing?" he asks me.

"Laundry, we can just hang and do that I guess." I say calmly. I feel like an idiot.

"Shit." His tick goes off again.

"Umm, yeah okay. But we have to take it to the laundry mat. We don't have a washing machine" He says to me and I'm the one to stare at him now.

"And mom usually-fuck shit- agh. She usually does it." He says. He's blushing, probably from the swearing.

"Oh, so you don't want to?" I ask. I wonder where the laundry mat is, it might be fun to go outside and walk. At least that's hanging out without talking, because I really don't know what to talk about.

"No, we could walk I guess." He shrugs and I nod at him.

I pick up the hamper, which is light and he grabs a coat and hat and mittens, like every other kid in Colorado he gets his gear on before adventuring the winter wonderland.

"Mom, fuck." He stops and calls down again. "We're going to go for a walk, be back later." He says and she comes into the hallway to say goodbye to us.

"See you soon sweetie, have fun." Her smile beams at me and I think she's happy he has a friend over. My parents usually get pissed when my friends come around.

"See you." I say politely, I'm going to work on my parent relations; it could help me out one day.

We walk in almost silence the whole way, he twitches kind of like my friend Tweek when his Tourette's goes off, and I listen to him swear randomly as we go into downtown North Park.

Before we get to the laundry mat, which is just outside his neighborhood and across the street, he stops and looks at me skeptically.

"So I met you at a television station and you came all the way here to hang out with me?" he asks and I nod at him like it's just that simple.

"And now you want to do my laundry?" he asks me and I kind of slump. I look at the gravel because it's easier than looking at him right now.

"Yes because I kind of said I'd do it for you when we met and it's a good way to hang out." I say.

It totally isn't, I don't think most boys my age know how to do laundry. It just happens to be the chore mom assigned to me, as soon as I was old enough to do chores. I do our laundry and my sister does the dishes and my dad takes out the trash. It's just the way we do things.

He nods at me when I look up and walks in front of me to open the door to the Laundry mat. It's tiny, and super old and very bright with those awful lights they use in our school too. But these lights flicker a bit. There's an Asian woman reading a book at the desk and she doesn't bother to look at us when she hears us come in. I go to a machine and reach in my pocket for the change I keep there. I put in a few quarters and start the wash, buying some laundry detergent from the vending machine. He sorts his clothes and piles them into the washers that I started and we sit down.

"So, you like to do laundry." He says and I nod because I really don't mind it.

"What do you like to do?" I offer, a conversation would be really good right now. I'm never the one to start them but I should in this instance or he'll hate me.

"Asshole." He says and I look up at him smiling. He avoids my eyes embarrassed again and I want to laugh at him.

"I like action figures, and ummm video games." He says and I nod. Those are cool things I guess.

"Yeah I have a Nintendo DS and I just started playing Metroid prime. It's sweet." I say and he nods.

"I played that one. I didn't know that robot guy was a chick the whole time." He says and I laugh.

"I played smash brothers before I bought that game so I recognized her, you can unlock the zero suit and see her without the armor on. It's cool."

"Oh, I want to play that. Sounds fun."

Well that was a great conversation. And now it's totally dead and we're staring at each other like retards. I have no clue what to do, maybe Thomas doesn't talk to other kids much.

"Fuck ass." He says and I laugh. The Asian lady sits up and looks over at him and he covers his mouth.

I look around, never been up to this part of North Park before. I see straight across the street there's a smoothie shop, even though our rural mountain towns are both full of hicks. Somehow these little businesses keep popping up, and North Park is slightly bigger I guess so maybe the business is doing pretty well. I still don't think mountain people like fruit stand so much.

Well that's something at least, I could use something to drink anyway. When in doubt, go out to eat, my father always says. He's referring to dates but it's true for most things, people like food. It's a given.

I jump up and he watches me a bit startled.

"So, you want to get a smoothie or what?" I ask and he stares across the street.

"What about my laundry Craig?" he asks and I look over to the Asian lady sitting by the desk.

"She'll make sure no one steals your clothes. Hang on." I say and I walk straight to her.

I smile, working on being polite is hard for me but I have this much experience down. "So my friend and I are going to the smoothie shop across the street, mind watching our machines till we come back?" I ask.

"Sure, whatever kid." She says through a thick accent.

"Sh-shit" I hear from across the room. Her eyebrows raise and I smile widely. So cool.

"Okay let's go." I say and without any argument Thomas follows me. Tweek would have freaked if I just left his stuff in a place, I can hear him freaking out now. I know they're not the same but I'm just comparing. I'm kind of glad Thomas is calmer than that. He seems a bit nervous sometimes, but maybe he's just embarrassed.

I open the door to the smoothie shop and notice there's a lot more people in here than I thought. The line is pretty long and there are a few people sitting in booths throughout the building. It's super bright, like each section of tables is its own fruit. It's a rainbow.

"Wow, I've never been to a place like this." I say and Thomas looks surprised at me.

"Oh? We go here all the time, well my mom does she gets me my drinks though." He says.

I look over the menu, it looks simple enough. I hate complicated menus. I can pick three fruits and they'll blend them up.

"What's good? What do you always get?" I ask and he looks the menu over.

"I get the yogurt one with Strawberries, raspberries and blueberries." He says.

"Sounds delicious." I say.

The lady in front of me is ordering and she's got her kids in front of her taking for freaking ever. I hate kids, they always waffle around.

I am a kid, but I am in the fourth grade and I do know how to order something. I'm not stupid you know.

"Cocksucker." I hear from beside me. Thomas's tick is strange, I wonder how it really works. His words kind of change between just a few. I might ask him about it some time.

The woman in front of me turns around and glares at both of us.

"Sorry mam." Thomas says and he looks so ashamed I want to hit him. Dude If I were swearing and a woman glared at me I would just flip her off. And I know he can't help it so I feel like telling her.

"I'm so thirsty, I can't wait." I say instead and Thomas looks over at me.

"Could you maybe get my drink please?" he asks me and I stare at him.

"Why? You're right here." I ask and he looks down embarrassed again. I don't get it.

"Fuck. F-fuck." He says and he covers his mouth.

"Excuse me young man but you need to watch you language. Where is your mother?" the woman in front of us asks.

"I'm sorry." Thomas says and she moves towards him, blocking me from moving to the counter to order our drinks.

"Sorry? That's naughty language young man and she should wash your mouth out with soap." This bitch nearly yells.

"I-I'm so sorry." He says and I feel myself getting aggravated.

"Listen lady, he has Tourette's syndrome, he can't help it. And you're making him feel bad so leave us alone." I say harshly.

Both of them look over at me and she stares between the two of us like she thinks I'm lying.

"Fuck ass. Cock." He says nervously and covers his mouth again.

"I can't believe you guys think this is a game, we are in a public place." She says and I roll my eyes at her.

This whole restaurant has stopped what they were doing to stare at us; I can hear the silence as they wait to see some kind of scene. It's not going to happen; I'm not into drama.

"Whatever lady, move out of my way." I say. She refuses and I push past her.

"Craig, we should go." I hear Thomas say but I ignore him. I want my damn smoothie.

"The nerve of you little bastards." She says exasperated but I refuse to talk anymore to her. She's an annoying bitch.

"Can I have two drinks? The large size please." I say and the teenage boy at the counter eyes me like I'm going to pull out a gun and rob him. I'm not that scary, really. I'm just a nine year old boy who swears a lot.

"What kind?" he asks, and despite his clear aversion to me being here he still sounds kind of bored.

I give him Thomas's order first then order my own drink and I make it snappy because that ladies kids pissed me off earlier taking forever. I ask for extra whipped cream, because it's my favorite part. The guy rolls his eyes at me so I don't bother to tip him. My mother always tips people who make her drinks, she also calls them some stupid name brastas or something. She's kind of dumb though, and besides this guy has no skills at talking with people. I might be a kid but I am a paying customer.

I hear the door open and close and the little bell rings out in the shop. I turn around and see that Thomas is outside sitting down on the sidewalk with his legs stretched out on the road.

"Here you go kid." The guy at the counter tells me. I grab the two drinks with both hands pushing them against each other to keep them stable.

I really wonder why Thomas is outside, actually I'd think that since his mom comes here so often the people might know him, you know. But Thomas did say she always grabs the drinks, maybe he never comes inside.

I walk outside and sit down next to him without him bothering to look at me.

"Here you go." I say handing him the drink.

"Thanks Craig." He says and I take a long sip of my smoothie, holy crap that's good.

"What are you doing sitting out here anyway?" I ask and he shakes his head.

"I shouldn't have went in there, its public." He says and I must be making a crazy face because he almost laughs at me.

"Why? Dude you can go wherever you want. It's a free country right?" I say and he shakes his head at me.

"Mom's and kids don't like hearing my Tourette's. It bothers them." He says and I do laugh at him. For the first time ever. I can't believe he's worried about something like that.

He looks confused at me, but I can't stop.

"Dude did you see her face, it was priceless." I say but he just shifts a bit away from me.

"It's not funny." He insists and now I'm laughing really hard.

"It is, because you said fuck ass cock straight to her face." I say and I kind of like the sound of that.

"Sh-shit." His tick goes off but he punches me in the arm to get me to stop giggling.

"Shut up." He says.

Hmm, he doesn't sound so mad I think to myself.

"She deserved it anyway, don't worry Thomas she'll live." I reassure him when he still hasn't drunken a bit of the smoothie I handed him.

"She- I mean her kids probably shouldn't hear stuff like that." He says.

I roll my eyes at him and he gasps in surprise, probably because I don't really care what her kids think or hear. I mean I've been hearing worse than that since I was in kindergarten. My father has a mouth like a sailor though so that's probably where I get it from.

"They'll hear it all eventually. And like I said in there, you can't help it right. So don't worry so much." I say and my butt is so cold right now that I have to stand up. I don't know how Thomas is even standing it, he's been out here longer.

We walk back to the laundry mat and I find the lone television set in the corner of the room, straight across from Thomas's machine. We watch the middle and end of some cartoon film, I have no clue what it was, my parents aren't into watching kids movies. Thomas knows it and he sits happily watching it. There's this mouse and some farm and I think a rat or something. She has a bunch of kids and there's an annoying raven. I change out his laundry from the washer to the dryer and we remember that we didn't bring a basket so we head back to his house, asking the lady to babysit his laundry again.

Thomas grabs the basket and some toys from his room and when we both get back to the laundry mat the movie is over and we sit and play with the little figurines he's collected.

He's a lot of fun, and I notice the more we play the less he seems to have his Tourette's. It's there, I know but I wonder if maybe nerves make it worse. I should really look this up. Because now that Thomas is playing with me he doesn't seem so on edge, and we end up having a lot of fun. I enjoy playing games, even though I know I'm getting kind of old for it.

I played with Clyde once and he gets really creative, I could hardly follow his story line. His mom came in and told me he's always like that, Clyde has a good imagination I guess. He can play with a cardboard box. I never had much of an imagination I guess, I like to copy things I've seen in movies but I'm not good at coming up with my own stuff.

I'm sure I don't like it so much because I've been in a class with that one group I mentioned earlier, the kids Kenny hangs out with. Those guys are always going off and doing things and having adventures that get them into trouble. I wouldn't ever want to be part of that.

Maybe I'm a boring guy. I don't know.

Thomas isn't over the top, but he's good at keeping things going. He tells me that he never plays with anyone else, and I think that's why he can come up with something to do.

He's also brought a coloring book, I didn't notice it until he pulled it out of the basket with a pack of crayons. Now he's sitting on the floor coloring in Spiderman verses the Green Goblin and I'm sitting on a bench with a pile of fresh clothes.

I love that smell, more than anything that smell really gets me. It's like heaven, having a warm shirt or sheet in your hands with the smell of detergent on it. I don't know what kind I bought but it smells like lavender, my mom always buys fresh mountain scent, which is kind of lame because I live in the freaking mountains and it doesn't smell anything like cow paddies and snow.

"Snow smells funny you know." I suddenly say out loud. We've been silent for a while now, since he started coloring I guess.

"Stupid shit." I hear and I watch as Thomas tries to concentrate enough to respond.

"It does, kind of stings your nose too." He says.

Oh good, I don't feel completely retarded now. I think most people don't know snow has a smell, but it does. You have to get a good pouring of flurries to catch the scent but he's right, it does sting.

"It doesn't smell anything like mountain fresh scent." I think aloud again and he turns to me.

"What's that?" he asks and I pause in folding a pair of his pants.

"Like the laundry smell or air freshener scents they sell in Walmart. It's always mountain fresh and cinnamon and vanilla or lavender. But my mom buys that one and it never stings your nose or just smells cold. Weird. It doesn't smell like mountains or trees or anything. It just smells like cleaning stuff." I put the stack of clothes in the basket sitting at my feet and realize I have nothing else to fold. We're finished already.

"You done?" he asks me and he starts gathering the toys he brought with him earlier. I nod picking up the basket with both hands. He jumps ahead of me and grabs the door, holding it open while I walk through.

"Ass Tits." He says loudly.

The woman at the desk sits up and shakes her head at both of us.

"Ahh, I hate this." He says almost to himself as we walk back home.

I think he hates his disorder, he looks kind of down. Back in the laundry mat that lady barely flinched when his tick went off. Maybe the movie was drowning it out. That last one was pretty loud though.

If I could tell the lady at the laundry mat ass tits to her face, it would make me so happy. I think I'm smiling all the way back to his house. He really is an interesting person to be around. I am so doing this again.


	2. Chapter 2

_Author's Note: So I want to note here and now that I know absolutely nothing about real Tourette's, if this in anyway offends someone, I am truly sorry. I am working with the characterization, whether it's reflective of the disorder or not. I didn't do much research (because I'm actually pretty lazy, even though this is something I will get around to doing). _

_Thomas is so much easier for me to do a POV for, maybe it's my own little anxiety problem coming out. Or maybe it's because Craig is kind of grumpy and apathetic._

_Thank you all for reading, I do appreciate it more than you could ever know. –Clover._

Thomas

The weirdest thing happened to me once, a lot weirder than the usual antics that follow my disorder. Being in public is always a bit terrifying for me, and since that stupid fat Eric kid started faking having Tourette's, I've been really on edge. I can't believe someone actually thinks this is fun to live with.

A couple of weeks ago this kid just showed up out of nowhere and asked me if he could do my laundry. He even asked me more than once. Well maybe he didn't come out of nowhere. Wait let's back track. I was trying to get rid of that faker kid and I met this guy who told me I was the coolest kid ever and then asked to do my laundry. I forgot about him, tried to forget about the whole incident but then one day he just showed up on my doorstep. He even biked all the way from his town to mine.

And you know what, even though I didn't want to hang out with him, because it was a really strange thing to do, we actually had fun.

Doing laundry together? Am I getting this desperate now?

I think he wants to be my friend, I don't have many friends. I used to have a few, when I was younger. My Tourette's has gotten worse over the years and back then it wasn't swear words so I could hang out with other kids. I didn't say things like ass and fuck which parents tend to hate. I have no clue how it developed this way, and I really wish I could blurt out something else. It would make my life so much easier.

It might even make my dad come back home.

No not thinking about that right now. Because I don't want to think about dad anymore, he doesn't want to be my dad anymore.

I don't want to think about how everyone is polite to me at school either but no one wants to be a real friend to me. They talk about me behind my back, and a lot of kids call me retarded. I'm not in any special classes, they know I go to meetings every once and while to try to "cope" with my disability. But it's a disorder, not a disability and I have never felt disabled so I don't know why people would say that.

I actually always thought I was smart. Not having friends means I have tons of time to get caught up in school.

And read books for fun.

And draw in my free time.

And play video games, or play pretend, or play with my toys.

I have lots of time actually, so I can work on more things than most boys my age do.

Ah who am I kidding, the only reason I even have so much time is because no one wants to come near me.

Not thinking about that either. I don't want to have one of my blue days. That is what mom calls it when either of us feels really down. Sometimes she doesn't leave her bed all day, she just goes to the bathroom and she doesn't even go to the kitchen to drink water she gets it out of the bathroom sink. She just stays in her pajamas sleeping or watching tv. She calls into work and if I try to talk to her she asks me to grab her some food and let her have some mommy time.

She's done that a lot since dad left, and some days I feel the same way too. I don't leave my room and she lets me stay home from school to have a "rest day". I don't like those days though, they aren't fun like the weekends. When I'm having a blue day I just sleep a lot. Sometimes I cry too, but I don't want anyone else to know that.

Craig is so strange, he's coming over today and I'm trying to clean my room for him. It's not that messy but I'm afraid he will try to move something, or ask me if he can vacuum or dust for me. I mean the guy did come over and do my laundry, maybe he's like a neat freak or something.

Ever since I started thinking that about him I couldn't bear to leave my room the way it was. Every time he asks me to hang out I end up cleaning like a maniac.

The day he randomly showed up he asked me for my phone number, and I got his. I haven't called him, the reason isn't because I didn't want to, it's because he calls me. We've spent nearly every weekend together for a few weeks now, and hanging out is actually kind of fun.

The second time he called me I didn't think it would be fun at all. But he got here and even though we didn't do anything, like go outside or see a movie we still had a bunch of fun together. I think he's a fun guy, I know I'm not. I don't see why he keeps calling me, but I figure he really wants to hang around or he wouldn't make such an effort.

I thought at first he just wanted to make fun of me or something, he kind of looks like a bully. Actually he sounds like most of the bullies at my school too, but he's never picked on me. Actually he stood up for me, which wasn't something I expected from him. Though even the first time we met I could tell he truly admired me. I have no idea why, the cussing thing? He wants to be able to do that? It makes me mad if that's really it, if he likes that I'm stuck with this horrible disorder.

Maybe a guy like him would handle it better than me. I don't know. It's weird though if that is it because every time my tick goes off he just continues talking to me. It's the most natural conversations I've ever had, even my mom acts odd when I cuss in the middle of talking.

I've seen him smile, and sometimes laugh but he always asks me something else or lets me finish.

Not once has he mistaken my Tourette's for actually swearing at him. I've said bitch around my mom before and she actually thought I was calling her one. I think sometimes she thinks I do, like I pretend it's my disorder but I'm just calling her names. I can kind of tell when she thinks that, she's not as nice to me afterwards and I can't apologize enough to her.

I'm not even sure what I've said around Craig, probably everything by now. He doesn't make a fuss over it so it's easy for me to forget.

I'm waiting for him, and he's late. His parents were driving him today because they didn't want him on the roads on his bike so late, and he's spending the night. It's hard to bike with a bunch of gear on your back, even if it only to the bus stops.

I'm not sure what he's said to his folks about me, I wonder if I will meet them tonight. I hope not, they'd probably think I'm a bad influence on their son. Even if you understand what Tourette's Syndrome is, you still don't want someone cussing up a storm around your kid. At least that's what most of the parents at my school think.

But this is my first sleep over ever and I don't know what to do for a sleep over. I hope Craig knows, because I don't want to do it wrong. I bet it's like hanging out for two days, but in a row.

I'm glad he's the one coming over to my house, I would be so nervous if I went over there. It would be the worst situation ever, because his parents would hear me say those things and they would probably get mad. And I might want to go back home in the middle of the night which would be so embarrassing, because I'm ten and I've never been to a slumber party or sleep over before. Craig told me he has, like a million times probably. I think he has lots of friends back home and he would never be the one to ask to go back to his house in the middle of the night.

I bet he has a ton of friends, and for some reason he's here with me. It doesn't make sense, I mean a guy who's been to a million sleep overs has to have something better to do with his weekend.

Maybe he realized that and decided not to come. Maybe he cancelled on me and I just didn't get the message. I walk across the room and grab the cheap cell phone mom got me for my birthday, just to keep in touch if I go somewhere. It's ridiculous, I don't go anywhere. But I have the cell phone now and that's what Craig keeps calling me on. He gave me his home phone saying his parents don't trust him not to break something that's so expensive. He also mimicked his dad's voice, which I assume is deep and more nasally than his own because that's how he mocked him, "Son, ten year olds do not need cell phones, it's fucking retarded."

His words not mine.

I have 0 messages on my cell phone. I sigh and look at the clock on the screen. He's only thirty minutes late. I didn't know before, but I think I hate waiting on people. It's weird because I'm usually hanging out alone so why should I even worry that it's taking him so long. I can totally occupy myself just fine, more than fine. I am a pro. It's probably because I've never had to wait like this before, I mean I wait on my mom all the time to go into stores while I sit in the car. But it doesn't feel like this.

I sit down and start reading a book on my shelf. It's one of the Hardy boys series, not sure which because they're all kind of the same. Kind of like any mystery series, same shit happening but different places, a lot like Scooby Doo. It's almost easy to distract myself reading, I have to read aloud every night because my speech teacher tells me it will help me talk better. It doesn't seem to make much of a difference; I still interrupt the Hardy boys going into that dark castle in the middle of a rain storm with a few cocksuckers, and piss ants, or whatever else comes crashing out of me. I have a feeling they would not be impressed by me hanging out with them, swearing up a storm when they're supposed to be silent. I don't make a good reader companion.

Which is why it's good that this is just make believe.

"Thomas" I hear my mom call and I jump up. That definitely sounds like he finally got here. I run out of my room and pause in the hallway to listen. I hear mom talking to Craig but there's a man's voice that interrupts her and I don't want to come down now. I wonder if his parents want to meet me too, or just need to talk to mom.

"Fuck ass." I say in the hallway. It's not loud but I hear Craig kick off his shoes.

"That's Thomas right? Hey come on down." He says a little too cheerily for my taste.

"Do you guys want to come in and sit, I have some beverages in the kitchen if you'd like." Mom says and I sincerely hope Craig's dad says no.

"Oh no thank you, I think we're just going to head out now. My wife is in the car, and we're planning to catch a movie with the kids gone tonight." He says loudly.

I do not like that loud voice, oh jeez. My dad is kind of soft spoken and his voice is definitely not that deep. I peer around the corner to take a look and I see that Craig's dad is huge. He looks like a modern day Viking, with red hair and huge shoulders and a belly. I can just see him with a shield and armor taking down foes. Craig looks over at me and waves but I duck back into the hallway out of sight.

"Asshole" I hear myself say and I try to cover up my mouth.

"See ya pops." Craig says rather unenthusiastically before I hear him mount my stairs at full speed. I shouldn't be hiding from him.

I kind of hear our parents chatting, Craig's father seems to be warning my mother that if his son misbehaves at all she is to call him. He'll set him straight.

"Why are you hiding out up here?" Craig asks me and I shrug.

"I was waiting up here for you. Why were you so late?" I ask trying to change the subject. I don't think telling him that his giant father scares the hell out of me is such a good idea.

"Oh my folks are always late, dad's a lazy asshole and my mom always forgets something. Sorry about that, we had to turn around halfway here for their wallets. Both of them forgot." He shakes his head like adults sometimes do to children who are constantly messing up. I laugh because Craig is so serious that sometimes it's funny.

"So what should we do?" I ask and he walks over into my room, he just goes wherever. It's odd that I let him, but I'm getting used to just following him around.

Craig digs through my toy chest, which is more like two plastic bins sitting next to each other. There's not much in them but he pulls out two of the action figures I allow myself to play with. Most are meant for display only, but these two shoot lasers and make sounds like they have jet packs. He hands me a red one and keeps the blue one for himself. He crashes his into mine and starts talking for the commander of the space fleet.

"Hey boy, I'm leaving now. If you misbehave I will ground you. Hear me son?" his father bellows up and I wonder for a second if he's going to come up the stairs or something.

"Kay dad, bye." Craig says and I can tell he barely paid attention to that.

"You're dad is really tall." I say and he looks over from his toy to me.

"Yep." He says bored already.

"Are you like, going to get that tall?" I ask him and he shakes his head at me.

"I'm not really psychic, you know that right?" he says and I make a confused sound at him.

"What?"

"Oh wait, you weren't there. I was playing super heroes with my friends and I got to be psychic, and I had telekresis" he says to me.

That sounds like fun, I would love to play super heroes with other people some time. I have a superman pajama set with a cape on them. I only wear them to bed sometimes, but it's fun to jump off the stairs and feel the cape waving behind me.

"Tele what?" I ask.

"You know, where you can throw stuff with your head." He says.

I can't help but laugh at him.

"You mean move things with your mind?" I say and he looks at me like I'm the one who's being stupid here.

"That's what I said." He says.

"Bastard face shit shit." I swear and his smile is back.

"It's pronounced telekinesis. But that's an awesome super power. I want to be psychic and telekinetic." I say.

"Yeah well, it was one of the better super powers. My friends are so lame. Clyde was playing a game with these idiots from school that I refuse to play with anymore. And he's so stupid, he was a mosquito, with like blood sucking powers or something lame. All he had was a stupid nose and some ketchup packets"

"That is lame. So did you start your own super hero group and like fight those other guys?" I ask curiously. That would be really awesome.

"No their super hero game got carried away, even though they all had strange powers that aren't good for saving people. Clyde told me his mosquito powers weren't as bad as Bradley's, that kid pretended he had mint berry crunch powers and no one could understand what that means. I'm so glad I wasn't forced through that mess. I actually got to avoid all the trouble it caused this time." Craig said and he rammed his blue fighting commander into a tank that was set up on my bed making a boom noise as he did so.

"So what kind of guys are they if they get into trouble so much?"

"You know that kid Kyle that you met?" he asks me and I nod yes. I remember Kyle, he's a bit fiery but he was really nice to me.

"God I hate that guy, him and his friends get into so much trouble. His fat friend made friends with Cthulhu and almost destroyed the world. It was bad news, and none of them even go grounded for it."

"Stupid shit." I say. And he laughs.

"Yep, it is stupid shit. He's joking with me, I can tell because he knew that was just my Tourette's again.

"That was them?" I ask.

I remember that time, it was pretty awful. The school got closed down and I had to sit at home with mom and all she did was watch the television coverage of stupid BP and their drilling fiascos. I heard South Park had a visit from the dark lord, and I wonder now how close Craig got to being thrown into a alternate universe or something.

"Yes, this one time they got me involved in their stupid shit," at this he nods to me grinning like a maniac and I chuckle "they made me get stuck in a Peruvian camp in Florida, then Guantanamo Bay, then we went to Peru. It was the worst thing ever." He glares down at the figure he's playing with and I laugh at the face he's making. I imagine if that action commander toy was any of the jerks he's talking about he'd throw it at the wall.

"Sounds awful." I say. I swear again and it's the first time he hasn't reacted at all to it, not even a grin.

"Gosh I hate those assholes." He says. He gives a little shake of his head, like he's dismissing their existence entirely and then he's back to the tank, trying to make it run over my toy.

We play in almost silence for a long time, well no, we are talking about the game and speaking for our toys but I don't consider it a conversation.

Mom calls up to me and tells me to come downstairs for dinner. I watch Craig jump up and he walks out of my room while I'm still getting up.

"I'm using the bathroom, be right down." He says and I nod at him.

My mom has small pans out and a bunch of stuff on the counter. Inside the pans are half cooked dough and I'm confused at first but then I notice a can of pizza sauce and a bunch of toppings. She's tossing stuff on her own pan, it looks like pineapple and Canadian bacon.

"Oh, where's Craig?" she asks me and I smile telling her he's in the bathroom.

"Are you two having fun?" she asks and I can tell she's a bit worried that we aren't going to. Like I'm too boring to play with. Maybe she's just worried cause I never invite kids over.

"We're having fun, playing with my action figures." I say and she nods at me happily.

"So I have the pizzas, it won't take long to bake and you guys can start a movie maybe? Get into some pajamas and settle down I think. I can make some popcorn for now, and then I have little desserts we can make too." She says and I wonder how she came up with such good ideas for a sleep over. I look at the desserts across the counter and it looks like pudding and gummy worms with oreos.

"Hey, whats for supper?" Craig asks and he jumps up on a stool by the island counter in the kitchen. My mom hands him a pan and he looks at it. I watch him poke the dough before turning to me in confusion.

"Mini pizzas man, here's some sauce." I say handing it to him.

I guess Craig really likes pizza, because he seems pretty happy about it.

I put cheese and parmesan cheese and a million little pepperoni on mine. My mom keeps handing me things and I decide after a while that I actually want everything. I put the onions and some peppers and olives on. Everything but the Canadian bacon and pineapple. It clashes too much.

Craig makes a meat pizza, my mom had a bit of sausage laid out and he put it on first. Then some pepperoni and a sparse amount of cheese. It's kind of a boring creation I realize, because mine is so colorful and I start playing with my olives while the oven pre heats.

I make a smiley face and Craig watches me do it for a bit. I move a lot of the cheese for some yellow hair and the pepperoni under it makes the pizza look like some kind of red guy who's way too happy.

"Okay boys, all done?" mom asks and we both nod.

She trades out the pizza stuff, I help her put it in the fridge and Craig pours himself a glass of root beer. My mom hands us the pudding mix and Oreos and a bowl of m&m's and marshmallows. We also get little parfait cups.

I pile mine in with Oreos first, for the ground I guess, then the pudding and worms and everything else I can cram in. I think Craig does it the opposite way, he points at the Oreos on top and informs me that those are the dirt and should be the top.

He's so serious about it I think maybe he wants me to pour mine out and try again but when I go to do it he just laughs and grabs both of ours, shoving them into a space in the fridge.

"Okay Why don't you boys go get ready for bed and we can eat pizza and put on a movie." Mom says and I jump up.

Craig stares at her like she's stupid, then he looks at the time.

"Why pajamas? It's not even 8:00pm yet. I'm not sleepy yet." He informs her.

I swear, I've been swearing off and on but this one is loud and distracts him for a second.

"So you kids can hang out in comfy clothes Craig, you don't have to go to bed or anything." She says just as seriously and he nods at her like he understands.

"Oh okay." He says and we go upstairs.

I change into my green pajamas. They have woody and buzz on them but only on the shirt. Craig puts on a red racer shirt and some loose shorts.

I'm kind of embarrassed that my pjs match and I feel like a kid until he says how much he likes them. We go back downstairs and I get out pillows and blankets and two tray tables for us to eat off of.

Craig likes action movies, I do too but my mom keeps saying we're not allowed to watch what he picks out. He keeps getting frustrated and at one point he argues with her that his parents let him watch those movies, he's holding up a copy of Reservoir Dogs that my dad owned. I haven't seen it but by the look on mom's face she's about to call his parents and he's going to get grounded.

I shouldn't have let him pick this out, I walk over and grab one of the dvds that is in my pile that isn't a cartoon. It's Transformers and Craig seems okay with this.

"I hate Shia Lebouf, he looks like a chick." Craig comments as the opening credits roll.

"Yeah I wish this was less about some whiney girl and a whore and more about the robots." I comment.

"Whiney girl?" he asks me and I point at Shia on the cover. Craig laughs at me, his little nasally laugh which has a snort at the end of it.

"Cock balls." I say while putting it on.

My mother sighs from the kitchen but I don't say anything. She does that sometimes. She comes in with our hot pizzas all smiles and we get settled down to eat.

I'm halfway through my pudding parfait and Craig has downed his, he actually licked out the glass he had which was really funny. He now has pudding all over his face but I don't think he cares because something is exploding on the screen. I make a noise mimicking it flinging out my arms and he does the same for the next explosion that follows.

"This was better in theaters, it was so loud and everybody was like "Whoa" when I went." Craig says.

"I'm sorry I missed that, sounds awesome." I say while making another boom noise, a car blew up I think.

"Why didn't you watch this in theaters? It was so sweet." He says and he looks almost offended by me.

"Oh, I'm not allowed to watch movies in movie theaters." I say and I shrug it off like it doesn't bother me.

But it does, there are so many movies I would love to watch with a big audience.

"And why is that?" he asks annoyed. I don't know what about but I still shrug at him.

"Because of the Tourette's?" he asks me.

"Yeah, people complain and then the usher comes and asks us to leave. It happened once in third grade and when my mom talked to the manager he asked if she would please just rent movies for me since I was disrupting. They can't actually ban me or anything." I say with a sigh.

Craig is totally ignoring the movie now, he's turned towards me with his mouth wide open like that is the most tragic thing ever.

"No way dude, you have to come to a movie with me sometime. I won't let them throw us out, and if you start swearing I can swear with you so nobody messes with us." He says.

It sounds like a perfectly reasonable thing to him, I can tell because he seems so confident about it.

"No way." I shoot him down.

I don't want to be stuck in a room where everyone hates me. That would suck."

"Oh but sometimes at our meetings Micheal turns on a movie on the projector and me and the other Tourette's kids watch something." I say, it's definitely not the same, and by Craig's face I can tell he thinks that is the sorriest thing he's ever heard of.

"Don't worry, we'll go one of these days, you can see what you've been missing out on." Craig says and I just nod at him.

Bumblebee is fighting now, and I like him so much that I don't really want to talk to Craig anymore.

While I'm picking out the next movie my mom comes into the room to observe, probably making sure Craig doesn't put on something inappropriate, which is super lame of her. But Craig sits and doesn't offer any opinion and I hope whatever I choose next isn't something he hates.

It's not that late, but I am getting tired and I could use something quieter. I still like scary movies though but I'm not sure what Craig wants so I make my best guess. I pick out The Mummy and put it on. Craig starts talking to me and I have to pause the movie because I can't really hear him.

"Sh-shit. What?" I ask and he's turned around to me so he can talk.

"I said I'm having a birthday party this weekend and I am giving your mom the invitation because it has the time and place on it. You want to come?" He asks. I don't really think it's a question, he just assumes I'm going.

I don't go to birthday parties, at least I haven't gone to one recently. I got invited to John's two years ago because his mom forced him to invite every kid in class, it was at the Skateland and I was only allowed to skate when the music was really loud. It was stupid, no one even talked to me the whole time.

"Umm, is it at your house?" I ask because I don't want to meet his parents.

"No, it's at Whistlin Willies, but they have an arcade and we can play there. You just need to get some tokens okay." He says and I nod at him.

"Is it okay for me to come?" I ask and my tick goes off because I think my neurological disorder likes to point out the obvious flaws in him inviting me.

"Oh hell yes, I already told my friends you were coming, they're excited to meet you." He says.

Craig rarely says anything as if it's exciting, and the way he says this is less than enthusiastic. But I have a feeling he's telling the truth about the first part, he did tell his friends. I doubt highly anyone is excited to meet me, unless they're all like Craig.

I fidget with my hands because I want to talk a bit, like ask if he warned them about me. But I figure if Craig is so chill than why can't I, it's not a big deal anyway. I can meet kids my own age, and I can make friends. Craig's friends are probably cooler than the guys at my school anyway, they're from South Park, and South Park has all sorts of crazy things happening all the time. Instead I think about the more important people I have to deal with.

"Did you tell your parents I have Tourette's syndrome?" I ask.

"Yeah, I told them a while ago. They forgot what it was, but I told them it's what Cartman was faking and they remembered."

"Fuck tits." Comes out of my mouth but I continue. "So did you tell them what mines like, like how I swear a lot?" I ask.

"Sure, they don't care. They are always cussing too, and it's not like you can help it. It's cool just come." He says dismissing anything else I had to say.

He turns the movie back on and I sit down thinking about Craig's birthday. I have to buy him a good gift, which means I have to go shopping to pick it out. I haven't been in a toy store for a while, but I know my mom can't just pick up something for him. I bet she will be so excited for me to go. I just don't know if I want to.

"I don't know if I really want to…." I go to say but he's looking at me and I stop myself. Because he looks kind of mad at me, and I can see he does actually want me to go.

"Listen Thomas, if I could have you come to my party, it would make me so happy." He says, and I really believe him.


	3. Chapter 3

_Author's note: A very happy birthday to this little grumpy bastard, we all love him I'm sure. It's hard having a gathering of a bunch of students who are just side characters, but I had a lot of fun with it. Most of their personalities are pretty easy to flesh out. I also couldn't help but add my second favorite one shot character, why he's friends with Craig I'll never know, maybe because he's super nice. I hope you all enjoy._

Craig

My Name is Craig Tucker and today I am turning eleven years old. This year my birthday falls on a Saturday, which I'm pretty sure hasn't happened before. My dad complained that he didn't get to eat as much cake, because we always have one for my actually birthday which I usually spend with just my family at grandma's house. She cooks my favorite food but other than that it's not really fun. My grandparents sit and watch the news or old game shows and everybody ignores each other so it's not even family time or anything.

On the weekend my mom always throws me a birthday party, she doesn't ask me where I want to go or what I'd like to do. She just hands me a stack of invitation on Monday and tells me I have to hand one to every kid in the class or else I don't get a party at all. I think it's a school rule, but my mom is always fair so I invite a bunch of people I hate to come eat pizza and play games. My friends aren't sure why I complain so much about it, the other kids have to bring presents so I get a ton of gifts. I don't really care about those though, that's about the only thing I like about inviting these guys.

Of course this year I finally realized, and I feel stupid for not knowing sooner, but my mom totally can't tell who can't come because they were too busy, and who can't come because I didn't invite them. So instead of the usual twenty four children running around there are only sixteen, and that huge number is only because once you invite one girl you have to invite them all. And all the girls know I have to invite them anyway, so I decided I didn't need them to either think I was singling one out because I liked her or something, or because girls gossip so much that they would probably just invite each other anyway. I have six boys from class and ten girls. It's fine though, the girls have their own table and they don't bother us at all.

I also invited my new friend Thomas, and he's not here yet. He's actually pretty late, I've been sitting here watching mom set up and holding onto all the gifts the people who come up to greet us hand me. If I had a cell phone I could call him, but I don't have one and I don't remember his number off the top of my head. And I don't know if Whistlin Willie's will let me use their phone since they got rid of the pay phone a few years ago.

My friends Token and Clyde walk over and ask me if I want to race one of them. I'm not sure I should go, because Thomas might walk in and the arcade has a wall up blocking most of the place. But Clyde is heinously insistent so I decide to go. Plus the racing game is my favorite.

"I wonder how many kids can fit in that photo machine." Clyde says while he leans over the seat I'm in. Token is four cars behind me and I'm concentrating extra hard to keep it that way.

"What?" I ask annoyed and he points to the thing, I can hear him move his arm almost across my vision and I angrily shove him away.

"You almost made me wreck." I say.

"It's right over there, one of those little photo booths. I bet we could fit everyone here in it if we squeeze in."

"Yeah whatever." Token passes the third car and a stupid herd of antelopes jump across in front of me. I hit one and hear the satisfying splat, I love this game. The blood hits the screen but I remember enough of the course to dodge around it until everything clears up again.

"Those things are really expensive man." Token says. This coming from him is funny, considering how rich he is.

"Yeah but there's a lot of us, and we only need to copy the pictures at home and print them off so we get our money's worth. Plus I bet they've never had this many kids try to fit before." Clyde says enthusiastically.

"Yeah okay, we'll make everyone pitch in." I say as the game ends. I win but I'm not happy that Token passed that second car so he gets a silver trophy. I wasn't even that far ahead of him this time.

"Let's go." Clyde says pulling me out of the seat. We get to the little photo booth and I step inside to examine it. It's going to cost us five dollars for two prints and we get four shots. I also sit in the bench and have Clyde sit beside me. It's already cramped but I can see us forcing our way in. I just worry that the camera will be too close to get us all.

Token kneels on the floor as I mess around with the options on the screen. There's not much I can do without putting money in it, but we're appearing on the screen so I can kind of take a guess at how this is going to turn out.

"Let me go get everybody." Clyde says excitedly but I pull him back in before he can dart around bothering people.

"Not yet, we have to wait until everyone gets here stupid." I can tell he's confused by that. He looks at Token and then back at me.

"I thought everyone was here already."

"No, I'm waiting for someone. He should be here any minute." I lie. I have no clue when Thomas will arrive but he's going to be the last one to show up now.

"Oh. Did you invite Kyle and Stan and those guys? I haven't seen them, is that who we're waiting for?" Token asks and I shake my head. My face probably betrays just how much I hate that idea. I purposefully did not invite those assholes. It's the best idea I've ever had, nothing in here has been destroyed and no idiotic celebrities have shown up to annoy us. I'm going to chuck that up for my brilliance this time around.

"So who's left?" Clyde finally asks. I think he's been staring at me waiting for me to tell them, but I didn't realize this at all.

"Thomas."

"Who's that?" he asks but Token answers before I get a chance.

"He's Craig's new friend from North Park, remember. Craig said he was coming." Token nods sagely.

"Oh yeah, I kind of remember you threatening us to be nice to him because he has that one thing right…that thing Cartman had."

"Eric did not have Tourette's Syndrome, he's just an asshole." I snap at him.

"Oh yeah." He says as if he's just remembered that fat ass is a huge fucking liar all the time.

I stand up and decide to check out the table my mom is using as a sort of base for all the birthday shit. There are balloons and streamers hanging everywhere so I don't think anyone could mistake where my party is at. I sit down on the bench again, even though my friends still want to play arcade games. I look around the room, still no Thomas.

A few other kids are sitting here, I think maybe they are taking a soda break. My friend Tweek is sitting across from me and he's got a thermos filled with coffee that he's sipping at. He wouldn't ever drink out of the little plastic cups mom laid out, for one he hates soda, too sweet he says. For two he only drinks from his thermos because anybody can put anything into an open cup. He's twitching like always and you almost have to laugh at how paranoid he can be.

"Hey Craig." He says for the fourth time today. Everytime I've seen him actually. I expect the happy birthday that follows and I'm not sure if I should correct him by telling him he doesn't have to say it every time he sees me.

"Hey man. Did you get to play a game?" I ask and he nods, then squeaks loudly. He's interrupted in his explanation by Butters who has walked up to us.

"Hey fellas, Tweek and I just played the scariest game with a bunch of wild animals and we had to shoot them. I shot a moose but I felt bad about it, poor little guy." He smiles cheerily and I immediately want to throw something at him. Butters is way too sweet. I don't even like sweet foods so why would I put up with a sweet person.

My mom and his mom are good friends, and that is the only reason I handed this fella an invite on Monday.

I'm distracted from the conversation that follows, Clyde insists that house of the living dead is ten times scarier than some hunting game, and Tweek freaks out at the idea of zombies popping up on screen. But I'm looking at the entrance and there's a boy standing by the door with his eyes right on me.

Thomas is looking at me and he doesn't make a move to come over or anything. He just kind of stares for a second then looks down at the present he has clutched in his hands. I don't see his mom anywhere so I assume she dropped him off here.

It's a bit before he looks back up at me and I realize he's not going to come over here, I wonder if he knows I can see him. Maybe his eye sight is bad or something. I stand up and walk over to him, leaving all of my friends sitting on the bench.

"You made it." I say as I walk up to him. I don't add that he was super late and I have been waiting on him. He's glancing around at any place he can land his eyes on. He looks super nervous.

"Cocksucker fuck asshole." He covers his mouth but I'm smiling. The family walking out stopped long enough to stare at us and I watch as he clenches his fists and closes his eyes a little too forcefully.

"Everything okay?" I ask.

"Yeah. Happy birthday Craig." He looks up handing me the present and puts on a rather forced smile.

"Come on you can meet the guys." I say heading in that direction. I hear him follow me like he's rushing.

I push Clyde over, almost off the bench to make room for Thomas. I sit where I've been sitting this whole time gesturing for him to fill up the space I just made for him. Clyde grunts at me and I flip him off before he can bitch about it.

"Hello." A very chipper Butters addresses the new comer and I watch as Thomas waves.

"Her father doesn't approve of her dating a dinosaur so she pretends to be kidnapped knowing it's going to take two plumbers six levels and a like a million days to rescue her so she can be with her boyfriend." I hear Clyde explaining his Mario theory to a few other guys.

Thomas makes one of his usual sounds that prequels a string of swears. His voice hikes up in pitch as he finishes off with "stupid ass"

The conversation that we both had intruded upon stops and I feel everyone staring at him like I am, except they look confused while I probably look like all my Christmases have come at once. That is the longest tick I've ever heard out of him.

"Oh god, I'm so sorry." He mumbles before anyone can say anything.

"So you must be Thomas." Token helpfully pipes up ignoring the profanity situation.

A few people nod like they understand now, and I think they all know not to say anything so he won't feel awkward.

"Yes I am."

"Nice to meet you, I'm Token." My friend says.

"If Craig wasn't such an asshole he would have introduced us all." Clyde nearly whines at me.

"I'm not an asshole."

"Yes you are, you're the host so you have to introduce your friends." He must have pulled that out of his ass considering neither of us has any sense of etiquette.

"You don't want me to introduce you guys." I state.

"I guess so huh. Craig would just insult us." Butters agrees with me.

"Okay?" Thomas mutters hesitantly. I don't know if he's confused by what they think about me or just doesn't know how to insult me the way they always do.

I actually don't want my so ca called friends making me look bad in front of him, but I also think introducing them all after Clyde's last comment would be funny.

"Fine, this is Token, he's black." I say and Token mutters an "Obviously ass hole" to me.

"And this is Clyde, he's the second fattest kid in our class and he gives girls shoes to go out with him." I gesture to Clyde who throws a cup at me.

"This is Butters, he's a fag. And that's Tweek, he doesn't get enough coffee during the day so he's usually asleep and super chill." I say sarcastically.

"Oh jeezus" Tweek squeaks before twitching like crazy. "I'm not a faggot." Butters whines at almost the same moment.

I look around the room and point to Gary and Jimmy who are chatting by a DDR machine.

"That's Jimmy, he tells funny jokes." I say in seriousness, I like Jimmy and it's not nice to make fun of the special ed students even if I am pissed off. "And that's Gary" I say loudly getting his attention. He steps up towards us as I finish. "He's a Mormon and he paints faces with his family the freaking Brady Bunch." I finish as he comes over.

Gary smiles, he always just smiles and I have no clue why this kid likes me but he does. Even though he never hangs out with the guys in my class anymore, I've still been in two classes with him. I invited Gary to my birthday because I don't hate him. I do not like him, but when I stared at the invite with his name scribbled in mom's handwriting, I thought might as well. He's so nice that you don't really care whether he's around or not.

"Hi everybody." He says almost as cheerfully as Butters. All of the boys are at the table now as Jimmy joins us.

"Hi uh, Gary." Thomas says. He clearly can see I've been making fun of these kids but the boys around us got over it pretty quickly. "Fuck bitch ass bitch." Follows and he clamps his hand over his mouth again.

"What?" Gary says and I tell him who Thomas is politely.

"Oh, uh I'm not allowed to listen to that kind of language." Gary informs us and he walks over to the girl table to chat with Wendy. I think he's just following a family rule, but Thomas looks stricken. He stares down at his cup not saying anything for a while.

"I'm sorry Craig." Thomas says to me after a few minutes have passed and I was distracted by the general conversation.

"Why? That was awesome, you are like Mormon repellent." I clamp a hand on his shoulder, but I really am impressed.

"Okay." He mumbles.

"So everybody is here now." Clyde tells me pointedly and I see him point to the photo booth. Oh yeah, we can take the picture.

"Alright, we're all going to pitch in the five dollars to see how many kids we can fit in the photo booth over there. Follow me." I say standing up.

"Whoopie, that sounds awesome." Butters comments and everyone seems to agree with him.

"I'll cover for Craig since it is your birthday dude." Token says and I have no problem letting him. With so many of us it's not even that much money.

I watch as the group of boys slip quarters nickels and dimes into the machine until it flashes that we're ready to go.

I sit down first, pushing the guys who want to get in because I can't make a selection if they crowd me.

"Hang on let me pick one first." I say.

Some of them are too cluttered with borders which will limit the space available for faces. I finally chose the sepia option with no border at all. It's either that or black and white.

I have three boys on the span of lap space between me and Clyde who gets the bench too, and I can barely squeeze my face through their shoulders so I'm actually in the shot. Gary and Jimmy lean in on the sides of the screen and Token is on all of our feet peeking his face up at the bottom. The closest person to me is Thomas who is sitting on my left knee right next to butters.

"Okay we have to smile for the first one, and then look serious, then make a funny face, then whatever guys." I hear Token say and everyone agrees.

I flip off the camera in the first one with a smirk that could be mistaken for a frown. The second one I still have my finger up and I glare ahead of me. The second one I stick out my tongue but I know my finger is almost in front of it. The last one I make a peace sign at the last minute but I smile at the kid next to me who has his mouth open sputtering out "Cock balls." It just kind of happened, and I didn't even feel the small smile when it happened. It isn't until I watch the two prints pop out of the slot on the outside of the machine that I realize what happened. It was maybe a minute sitting in there but I still feel kind of cramped and uncomfortable.

"Oh man, these are awesome." Clyde says as he stares over the pictures. Everyone else followed the directions to a T and I watch as Clyde knits his eyebrows as he notices me.

"Craig you ass hole, you flipped us off and frowned in every shot." He says.

"What did you expect." I say grabbing it from him.

"I don't know if I'm going to need a copy of these, my mom won't let me keep it if you're flipping off the camera, it's not very nice." Gary says leaning over to take a look at it.

We all ignore him, I don't care if he wanted a copy or not. He should just suck it up.

"You were supposed to smile dumbass." Token says looking annoyed as well.

"Whatever."

"He did smile, look there." Butters says pointing to the last picture.

"Yeah but Thomas is talking, look his mouth is open." Considering the rest of them are making strange poses I really don't think it matters.

"What did he say? You look like you're laughing. Gary asks.

"Oh, nothing." I look over at Thomas who looks nervous again. He catches my eye but turns away again almost immediately. I guess no one else heard him, it wasn't that loud this time.

"You really must like swearing." Butters says.

Maybe not.

Thomas makes a small noise in his throat and I go to say something but then Clyde is jumping up and down.

"I think your mom is calling us over for cake." Clyde nearly shouts excited.

I turn around and sure enough mom is waving at us. I watch as she turns around grabbing plates and setting them out. My friends wander over to her but I stay in place. Thomas is still standing next to me too.

"They're nice." He says to me and I give him a funny look. I would never call my friends nice but he's smiling softly so I think he means it.

"Yeah, stupid though." I shrug and turn back to the machine.

"Let's take another one real quick, mom's going to be a while anyway." I say jumping back into the photo booth.

I want one of just me and Thomas since it's his first time here. Plus I really liked the border frames and I don't want to be cheated out on one.

"What? You sure? I think she wants you to blow out candles –ugh fucking pussy ass." He pauses taking a deep breath before continuing. "And they're going to be waiting."

I have shoved a five dollar bill into the machine, so now he has to take pictures with me or else I will waste money. I pull him in and he sits down on the bench.

"This is way better, I'm so glad I don't have guys all over me right now. That was way too cramped." I say flipping through the menu options.

"Yeah, but that was a really cool picture."

"This one's going to be cooler. Since it's just the two of us I can pick out something neat."

"Which one do you want?" he asks.

"It's between the outer space one or the wanted poster. What do you think?" I say. Either would be cool, I would rather cowboy hats for the wanted poster so I am leaning for the space ships. It would be fun to bring my space helmet here one day and take a picture in that too. There's rockets all over and a bunch of stars for the back ground which is pretty sweet.

"The wanted poster I guess." Thomas says and I click on it.

"Okay what should we do?" I ask and he just looks at me.

"Take a picture?" he raises an eyebrow and I sigh.

"No, what kind of faces should we make?"

"Maybe something goofy?"

"Okay, and the second one we can act like we're fighting. You should punch me and I'll turn away from the screen like I've been hit." I've seen that before and I think it's pretty funny.

"Shit ass dammit god dammit." He swears. "I'm not going to punch you."

"No, cause I'd totally kick your ass. Just pretend. And the third one we can glare like it's our mug shots." I say and he nods at me.

"Because we're outlaws right?" He says seriously and I nod at him.

I go to click the button but he grabs my hand as it hovers over the button.

"Wait, you have to actually smile this time. No laughing at me either." He says and I shake my head at him.

"No, I don't smile for pictures."

I really don't, every one of my yearbooks has me sitting still glaring at the camera. My mom has two family photos of us for holidays or whatever and in both of them I'm frowning looking bored. I even frowned in my baby picture, so I'm not going to start smiling at the camera now.

"Oh come on, you should do it. We need a good shot too." Thomas says.

I find myself nodding at him, even though I'm not going to do it. Then before he can motivate me to pretend to be the happy joyful bastard I'm not I click the go button.

Thomas is not interrupted by his Tourette's at all during this round and the first shot I stretch out my mouth with both middle fingers and stick out my tongue. He makes a kissy face to the screen with his thumb and forefingers making a circle as his puts up glasses hands around his eyes. He nearly punches my face before I turn away and pose during the second shot. We both glare hard at the camera the third time. By the fourth countdown I'm looking over at him because his glare was so intense that I have to wonder what he was thinking about.

He turns to me on the two and smiles a toothy grin my way. I think I just react to it because I find my mouth open and there's a flash.

"What the hell, we missed it." I yell and I grab for the controls to see if we can go back or something,

"Oh well Craig, I'm sure it's still an okay picture." He says and I have to give up because the screen is at start again, selling me another pitch to buy more pictures.

It takes a bit to print them off and when I look at my mom she is scowling at me and waving me over to her. I hold up my hand telling her to wait and she flips me off over the crowd. I do the same to her and she has to turn all the way around from me after that. I think she's fuming.

When the pictures come out I try to rush over to the table but mid step I have to stop. I've glanced down and I can't believe how good these are. The last picture we took is really good, I'm smiling and I never look good smiling. It's always super fake, I've only caught it in the mirror a couple times before swearing I'll never do it again.

And Thomas looks really happy, happier than I've ever seen him. There we are, captured for all of time smiling like retards at each other, not even looking at the camera. And even though I can see crooked teeth and his hair is kind of messy, it's really good.

I hand the strip of photos to him and watch his reaction as he scans it.

"These turned out really good." He says softly.

"Yeah." I watch him touch the strip with one finger, and I'm leaning over him now to try to understand what he sees. He's been staring for a while now.

"Craig get over here." The whole table yells and we kind of jump out of what we were doing.

He hastily shoves the strip into a big pocket in his jacket and I pull out my wallet and deposit the strip so it won't be folded or bent. I don't really want to show it off to the other guys, I really don't want them to know what my smile looks like. We rush over to the table and I'm forced to sit at the front while the kids who came for my party start to surround me, leaving the girls table and most of the arcade empty.

There is a cake in front of me with race cars on it, I get to keep the toys which is a lot better than some picture made of icing. They all start singing to me and I want to shrink down into my seat. I hate the Happy Birthday song, and it never ceases to embarrass me. And I know everyone here who's not at my party is silently cursing the world for having to sit through this, yeah me too guys. I frown as my mom takes pictures while singing and I must have rolled my eyes when they all stopped because I feel her hit the back of my head.

"Craig, blow out your candles and behave young man." She tells me. I glare up at her but refrain from saying anything else. I just blow out my candles and watch as everybody claps for me. Mom is suddenly in front of me with a knife and I back away so she can cut the cake for everyone.

"We'll open up presents after this sweetie." She says and I nod at her.

Butters starts stacking all the gifts next to me while the cake gets passed out, which is ridiculous because I could have walked over and sat where I had originally stacked them. He even smiles at me like I should congratulate him for being such an ass wipe.

I listen to everyone for a while, not really talking to them. I just poke at all the icing on my cake, it's too sweet and this year she got buttercream which I can't stand to eat. I like whipped cream and sometimes cream cheese. But like most sweet foods fudge or buttercream makes me gag.

One of the girls asks for my icing, she leans over and grabs the glob and I sit as far away from her as she licks it off her fingers.

"That is so gross."

"Why? It's really good and you weren't going to eat it." She says.

"It was on my plate, you're going to get all my germs from eating that." I inform her. She looks unimpressed and grabs the rest of the icing off the plate.

"Oh man, she is going to get so sick, like all kinds of stuff man. And they'll know, I mean if they can plant bugs in our houses and listen to everything we say they've got to know about this man. Augh." Tweek rants and everybody blinks at him. I don't know if even he knows half the shit he talks about. I might feel insulted by his apparent opinion that I have tons of diseases, but it's just Tweek being Tweek.

"Don't worry, everything's fine Tweek. She didn't get any germs." Token calmly tells him.

"Can you please go away?" I turn to the girl who is still hovering beside me.

"No, I can stand where I want Craig." She says and I roll my eyes at her.

"Go back to the girl table alright." I suggest meanly and she huffs at me before turning on her heel and going away.

"Dude Craig, I think Esther likes you." Clyde says and I turn to him annoyed.

"Esther likes icing not me."

"No dude, I mean she could have just gotten another slice of cake right." Token pipes in.

"So what?"

"So she chose your plate to eat off of. Maybe you should ask her out." Butters says.

I roll my eyes and poke at what's still left on my plate.

"She's cute, you should totally ask her out." Token says, and I think he's trying to get me into this conversation.

"No."

"Why not?" Clyde asks me scooting closer.

I scan all the people who are staring at me not believing for a second that we are having this stupid conversation.

"I don't care about Esther okay, she just wanted some icing that's all."

"You don't like her?" Butters asks.

"No. I don't like her." I say and several of them nod like I've told them something they couldn't have already known.

"Do you like someone else?" Clyde asks and I know it's just because the thought of someone who's not entirely girl crazy like him not liking anybody is killing him.

"I don't like anybody." I pop the last bit of vanilla cake into my mouth so I don't have to continue this conversation any more.

"Yeah I guess that's right, Craig hates just about everybody." Token says and I find that most of my friends are agreeing with him.

"I don't hate everybody."

"Yeah, you hate almost everybody at least." Clyde corrects me. I flip him off and huff.

"If we asked you who you liked here you'd say you don't like anybody. I mean when was the last time you thought you liked someone?" Token says.

Everybody is still staring at me.

"If I didn't like people why would I have a bunch of you here at my birthday party?" I tell them.

"Presents right? " Token says

We all know your mom makes you invite us. So whatever Craig. You're so grumpy and we all know you hate us. You tell us all the time." Clyde says.

I do tell Clyde I hate him, but only because he annoys me constantly. Clyde's also my best friend so I can say shit like that to him.

"I like Thomas." I tell them. Because that is the last person I decided I like, I went out of my way to find him.

I do like Thomas, more than I like any of them, at least he doesn't make fun of me constantly. Thomas makes a strangled noise and stares at me. Everyone is now focusing their attention on him.

"Oh yeah that is right huh. I wonder why." Token says.

"Because he's a cool guy." I state matter of factly.

"It's because he gets away with swearing all the time, isn't it." Clyde says and I shake my head at him.

"You like me because I can't help but swear a lot?" Thomas asks. He's frowning at me.

"No, I just think you're cool." I say.

Nothing really happens after that, he doesn't say anything else to me and my friends change the conversation entirely. I zone out during it not really noticing that mom removed my plate and refilled my cup of root beer.

I glance over at the girl table and see them giggling, Esther is talking to Sally and Annie and they all look my way before giggling. I get the creeping feeling that maybe the guys weren't so far off about her. She waves at me and I find myself waving back, not because I want to though.

I don't even know who she is, and I really don't want to get to know her. If Esther has a crush on me or something, well that's just stupid. Because I doubt I've said an entire word to her before this, she doesn't know me.

I hear Thomas swear and he covers his mouth every time. He's just as quiet as I'm being, probably because he doesn't know the people here. I hope he doesn't think what Clyde says is true. Probably it was, I mean the first time we met it definitely was true. I kind of get a warm fuzzy feeling whenever some profanity comes out of his mouth. But it's really stupid of me, so I'm trying to ignore it. The more I hang out with him the more I can see that his Tourette's is ruining his life, and I guess I've become disenchanted by it. I mean this is the first birthday party he's been to in years, and we had his first sleep over together. That's just sad.

I thought Thomas would have had a lot of friends. I didn't even think that maybe no one at his school likes him. But he told me they don't and I feel really bad for him. I know people are just being unfair to him, I mean Thomas isn't one of those loser kids, so no one should treat him like an outcast or whatever. I wish he could come to my school, because he'd make a ton of friends really easily.

My mom starts handing me birthday presents and I start opening them while everybody watches and claps while I thank people for whatever the hell they got me. I get two of the same gift, a star wars lego set from both Red and Gary. I'll return one of them eventually I guess. Token got me a fancy helicopter with remote controls that let it go farther than any version before it. I almost take it out of the box then and there to play with it but mom bonks me on the head saying it's unfair to the other toys and that I should finish opening presents.

When I'm opening a gift from Wendy she starts piping in with a form of commentary I guess.

"So I picked one of these out for Stan at his birthday, but it was a nicer one and I did get him other stuff because he is my boyfriend you know. But I got him the green one and I just thought blue was more your color, even though I haven't seen the show or anything. I don't even know which one he is right." She says to me.

I unwrap an action hero from a popular show that I've never seen before. They are ninjas who caste spells too and form together to make a giant robot. It's a lot like power rangers I think. I know Stan watches them sometimes.

"Thanks Wendy." I say and I set it in a stack with the others.

"Oh yeah, I was going to ask you where Stanley is anyway." Wendy says and I'm about to tell her he's not here and he's definitely not coming because I hate his stupid face but my mom walks over and is staring at me too.

"Craig, I noticed some of the boys from your class aren't here." She says and I nod at her, because it's obvious.

"Yeah, Craig hates those guys." Clyde says and I elbow him in the side.

"Did you not invite Stan?" Wendy asks and I think she knows exactly what she's doing when she says it.

"Yeah Kyle's not here either, and I heard they were going to play guitar hero today at his house. Why aren't they at your party?" Bebe says.

"Craig Tucker." Mom growls and I immediately look at her.

"They couldn't make it I guess." I say hoping she buys it.

"We have one rule in this house young man, and your school says you have to invite everyone in class. What the hell were you thinking not inviting those two?"

"Well he didn't invite Cartman or Kenny either." Clyde says and I think I'm going to punch him.

"It doesn't matter okay." I try but my mom looks even more pissed.

"After this party you are grounded mister."

"But mom."

She hits me in the back of the head again and I cross my arms glaring across the table.

"Craig didn't invite Bradely or Kevin either." Butters says like he's helping and my mom starts picking up presents and putting them in a bag.

"Alright young man, I am taking one present for every person you failed to invite for a whole month. And you know what, next year I'm not going to bother throwing you a party if you can't listen to me."

"Fine, don't. I never wanted one anyway." I say watching her shove the helicopter from Token into a bag. If I were the crying type that right there nearly do it for me, that was the best gift I've ever gotten.

"Here take the ones I haven't opened yet too, might as well take them all since you're going to be a bitch about this." I say.

"Craig." She nearly yells.

"Stupid bitch." I hear from beside me and I turn to see Thomas once again covering his mouth.

"Craig that's enough out of you, you hear me." She says angrily. "I won't have you swearing at me young man."

"But I-"

"That wasn't Craig Mrs. Tucker." Token says to her.

Thomas looks like he wants to disappear into his chair, his face is flushed and I don't want anyone singling him out right now.

Whistlin Willie comes up from behind us and he's trying to get us all to whistle with him, because this looks like the best fucking time to bother the birthday table with all the yelling going on. I really want to punch him right now. This is so freaking unfair.

"Finish opening your presents and I get to choose which ones you get to keep." She says to me. I rip off the paper on the next one with such a feral rage that I nearly tear the cardboard too.

"Sh-shit. Fucking bitch shit." I think everyone can hear Thomas this time but I'm still too pissed to see. I got a Disney movie from one of the girls that I never want to see. I say thank you to her so tightly I doubt she even heard me.

"Excuse me young man?" The mascot is saying to my friend.

"Sorry." He says.

"Which one of you was that, Craig are you trying to get into even more trouble. I will take every goddamned toy away from you." Mom is saying, having stepped away for a second.

"No." I say.

"That was a very naughty thing to say." Whistlin Willie is telling Thomas and suddenly I hear a string of "Shits" as he jumps up and runs to the bathroom, covering his mouth the whole way.

"Go away you fat stupid minimum wage loser." I tell Whistlin Willie.

He does go away, not before lecturing us all about being polite and not using potty language and before I can tell him about my friends disorder to do a bit of guilt tripping of my own my mom is pulling me aside to have a chat with me.

"Craig I don't know what's wrong with you today but you have no business embarrassing me like this. I'm trying to give you a good birthday here and you're being so mean and ungrateful" She's saying and she's giving me this pleading look like she wants me to behave because she loves me so friggin much.

"I'm not, I just didn't invite those guys, sorry geez." I say.

"No all this swearing, it's inappropriate."

"That was Thomas, I told you he can't help it. And now you made him feel bad." I say.

She looks very confused and I realize she has no idea what I'm talking about.

"I invited my friend who has Tourette's Syndrome and he can't control what he says. He's the one who was swearing just then." I cross my arms to look at her.

"Oh my, I'm sorry. But you didn't bother to introduce me to him, how was I supposed to know."

"Because I told you he was coming and not to make a huge deal out of it." I say crossly.

She gives me a hug, I have no idea why. I just stand stock still enduring it for a minute, hoping this will pacify her enough to leave me alone. After she was mean to me I'm pretty confused by whatever she thinks she's accomplishing. Moms are so weird.

"Okay you be good for the rest of the party. I still want those gifts though." She says standing up and acting like she didn't just embarrass me in front of my friends with her motherly affection.

I don't finish opening my presents. I walk back to the table and tell everyone that I'm going to the bathroom.

I'm going to find Thomas, who still hasn't come out.

No one is in the bathroom when I walk in it from what I can see. A guys bathroom is always uncomfortable to be in, and I don't want to walk around here for too long, I hear noises from the last stall and I walk down to it.

"Ass hole Cock." I hear from inside and I know for sure my friends in there.

I'm not sure how you address someone who's in a bathroom. Part of me is sure he is not taking a shit or anything in there, but if I'm wrong I'm going to look really stupid. He's been here for so long though that I think it's reasonable to check on him.

"Uh Thomas, you in there?" I ask stupidly. I just heard him, of course he's there.

"Yeah." He says.

"Are you okay?" I ask unsure of what to say.

"I'm fine." He says.

He doesn't sound fine, he sounds like he was crying or something. I listen to another string of swear words and he makes a very frustrated sound afterwards.

"Can you come out please?" I say.

He stands up, and I realize he was sitting on the floor. He opens the door and wipes at his face with his sleeve. Maybe he wasn't crying, I can't tell. But he looks really stressed out.

"Why are you in there?" I ask.

"I'm sorry Craig." He twists his fingers together nervously. "I'm sorry I ruined your party. I shouldn't have come." He says.

"No, you didn't ruin anything. I asked for you to come. That guy was being an asshole." I say but he's shaking his head like he doesn't believe me.

"I made you're mom mad and now she's going to take more gifts from you."

"No, my mom is being a bitch and she's not mad at you. I'm the one who pissed her off but she'll get over it." I look at him, he's staring down at the ground frowning.

"You know my mom sort of forgot you were here, I just told her to knock it off and she says she's sorry man." I reach out and grab his shoulder giving it a bit of a squeeze.

"I should just go home." Thomas reaches into his pocket for his cell phone but I stop him.

"No, I want you to stay. Stop being such a drama queen. We're going to play some games and I still have presents to open. Who cares if some fat guy in a stupid suit yelled at you. You don't have to see anybody here ever again if you don't want to. I just want you to have some fun okay."

"You must really get off on listening to me say shit huh." He says. When he looks up at me he's glaring a bit and I remove my hand from his shoulder. He looks almost mad at me.

"You must think it's so fucking fun to be me, and to embarrass myself all the time. Because sticking your middle finger out to every grown up you meet is so cool right? And if you could call everyone you meet a fucking ass hole you'd be so happy." He pulls away and starts stalking off out of the bathroom.

"Is that what you really think?" I ask and he stops not turning around to me.

It's silent for a minute and I think he expects me to say something else. But given that I never gave much thought to this I don't know what to say. He's mad and I think maybe I should deny it but I've never been that good at telling people things. Part of me knows he's right anway.

H sighs at me. I hear his tick go off again but when he turns towards me I'm not smiling, I don't feel like laughing about it. It's gone off like crazy since he got here and I think it's due to stress.

"I wanted to be your friend because you're interesting and fun. So just stay at my party." I don't know if he believes me. I don't want to have to convince him either.

I don't expect him to nod at me, I expect him to accuse me of something else. But to my surprise he does nod and then he shrugs giving me a half smile.

"Okay fine, screw those guys. We should go play skee ball after you open presents. I'm really good at it." He says.

We do play skee ball and he is really good at it. He gets the small ring 9 out of 10 times and a bunch of kids come and watch him try again the second round.

Everything gets much better after that. I get to keep a few of my gifts, and mom took only one lego set so I actually have one to play with. People start heading home and I know even though I'm kind of done with this party that I can't leave until everyone else does. I busy myself with a bunch of games. I even play the racing game with Thomas five times in a row before he wins and I get so mad that we stop. He laughs at me when I tell him he ruined my perfect record.

Almost everybody else has left and I'm standing next to the table watching mom put the leftover food into bags. She hands Mrs. Stotch half the cake and tells her to share it before mom has to take it home and dad ends up with diabetes. They walk out together and I sit next to Thomas who is waiting on his mom to pick him up.

"I forgot to give you this." He says as I'm playing with the box of legos. I watch him for a second and he reaches under the table to where he had been sitting. He pulls out a blue box. I notice that the wrapping paper has snowflakes on it and I guess pretty quickly that he only had Christmas paper to wrap it in.

I hand him the box of legos to hold and he hands me the present.

"I grabbed this when your mom told you she was taking presents. I thought if nothing else I could give it to you next time I saw you so you could keep it in case she got really mad and took them all." He grins at me slyly.

"That's was really smart, thank you." I say with as much admiration as I am feeling. I can't believe he was so thoughtful.

"It's not a very good gift, sorry. I didn't know what you liked." He stares at the Legos box. "It's not as cool as this, I've been wanting a star wars set for a while."

"Well you can have that one." I say seriously.

"Oh no, it's your gift Craig don't be ridiculous." He shakes his head at me.

"No you can totally keep it. I got two remember."

"But your mom took the other one, you get to keep this one now."

"So, I can wait a month. Plus you like it, so you should totally keep it." I say.

He looks reluctant, but now that I've made up my mind I'm going to make him take it home with him,

"I can't" he argues one last time.

"Listen take it now or next weekend I will come to your house and bury it in you toy chest. Mwhaa haa haa ha." I like that he accepts his fate and puts it to the side of him to take home. My evil laugh probably helped with his decision.

He's waiting for me to open up his present so I start unwrapping it.

I pull out a LED board with writing pens. It says glows in the dark all over and I start turning it around.

"There's a block too, so you can write messages on it and it's three dimensional." He tells me.

There is indeed a little block and I turn it around, it's small enough to fit into my pocket.

"So I can write on this and it glows in the dark?" I ask and he nods at me.

"You can draw on it too, and it just erases." He looks at me gauging whether I like it or not.

"This is really cool. Thanks Thomas." I tell him and he shrugs.

"Like I said, it's not like a toy so it's not really great. But I thought it was neat."

"It is neat, I can't wait to try it out." I tell him.

He smiles and then reaches into his pocket. I realize his phone is ringing and he answers it quickly.

"Hey mom, no everyone is going home now. Yeah I'm on my way out." He tells her. I watch him listen to her and he bites his lip nervously.

"I kind of did for a bit, but it turned out okay….no it was fun." He looks at me then adds "It was really fun. Craig and his friends were really cool and we got to play a lot of games."

When he hangs up I stand and we both walk out of Whistlin' Willies together.

"Thanks again for coming." I tell him and he gives me a wave and goes to the car.

"Happy birthday Craig. We should hang out next weekend." He calls to me.

"Yeah, we totally should." I say before heading to my own car.

It's later that night when I finish unwrapping all the toys I get to keep. I'm disappointed that I don't get to play with a cool RC helicopter right now but mom is already warming back up to me. Maybe I can get her to give them back in two weeks or so.

I turn off my light for bed and everything goes dark except one corner of the room. I look over and my little LCD glow in the dark screen is glowing. There's a bunch of blue and green letters and I walk over to check it out.

I realize that Thomas must have opened up the thing and drawn on it before resealing it again. There is a big blue lettered happy birthday Craig on it. There are some balloons around the letters and then at the bottom is a picture of me and him.

It's actually a good picture of just two floating heads. I'm making a normal kind of face and Thomas is smiling. I'm wearing my blue hat and he's got a bit of my black hair sticking out from it. It's just a cartoon drawing but it does kind of look like me. It's way better than the drawings I've seen in art class by any of the eleven year olds that go to my school.

I find myself smiling down at it, and I think while staring at that little picture, that I never want to erase this board again.

_It's a bit of a process to come up with random swears for Thomas to blurt out. I try to put the ones he actually did say in his episode, but there's not too much from him. Cartman spoke more, and his was fake. I swear more than I should so I kind of put whatever sounds good at the moment. Fuck ass is definitely one of my favs, borrowed by a very profanity filled movie, Boondock Saints. This is one that was a lot of fun to write. _

_And the little toy I picked out is the result of me not knowing what to do, and google saving me. I've seen the little LED screens in person, they're pretty sweet plus I figure Thomas can collect pictures and work on drawings like an artist._


End file.
